Stories and happenings in the life of a flight attendant written after my book.
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All photos by Penguin Scott unless noted.

Sunday, June 7, 2015

Adventures in Flight: Rite of Aviation

Photo of Delta Crew

A
flight attendant has her photo taken in the cowling of an airliner
engine. It's something that's been done thousands of times. Even
before engines had cowlings for us to climb into, sexy young flight
attendants had photos taken sitting on the front of a propeller. It's
a rite of aviation, something flight and ground crews do for the
unique privilege of having access to doing so.

But
in the case of this young flight attendant, a passenger witnessed her
being photographed before boarding a flight. Then lo and behold, the
woman being photographed was one of the flight attendants working her
flight. The passenger obtained her name, found her on social media
and then went to her local news team, who ate it up, and spat out a
story about the photos; questioning its safety and necessity. They
released the full name of the flight attendant, surely without
permission, but never mentioned the tattle tale passenger.

When
the news hit social media, saying she could lose her job, I caught
wind of it right away. I immediately found the photo I had of myself
in an engine and sent it to the newscaster's social media page. I
then suggested to the flight attendant community that we all do so,
and before I knew it, a movement had started. Hundreds of flight
attendants world wide sent in photos and scathing letters.

Penguin and a 737 Engine

A
few nights later, perhaps under pressure, the newscaster aired a
second story. At first, I thought he was going to redeem himself with
a new story about how this was really nothing. He explained the
support from around the world, showed numerous photos of similar
nature, including the one I sent him, and even included a few
soundbites from our union president. Things were looking good, and it
was exciting, knowing my photo was on the news.

But
then he went and interviewed passengers to drum up support for his
original story, which seemed to be that something dangerous went on
here. He interviewed passengers? Passengers can be quite unknowing
about the goings on of things aeronautical. They are often scared of
bumps and aircraft noises, leery of crew and suspicious of other
travelers. After all, look at how this whole mess started...a
paranoid passenger who witnessed something that has happened
thousands and thousands of times, and freaking out about it to the
news media! Hello!

Flight crews in support of Ericka

One
thing every photo you may have seen of crew members in engines is
this...someone has taken the photo. Usually a pilot or mechanic, or
other crew with pilots and or mechanics present. We don't go around
jumping up into engines all willy-nilly and risking the safety of the
very conveyance that will be taking us to our destination. We are a
trained group of professionals. We are the first line of defense on
board aircraft. We are screened and trained and overseen. We are
flight attendants.

Better
news stories might include adequate crew rest, job outsourcing, feet
dragging in negotiation of new work contracts, putting the customer
experience before safety concerns, food storage procedures or the
obscene salaries of those at the top. But no, we went with an aviation
rite misunderstood by a passenger and a news team who failed to do a
thorough investigation.

This
was a nothing story about a special privilege enjoyed by countless
personnel in a safe fashion. It's a shame it was put under the bright
light of confusion and scrutiny, but I'm proud of having had a hand
in bringing some sanity back to the fore. So next time you're at the
airport and see flight crew posing for photos on the tarmac, it's all
right to be a bit jealous...we've worked hard to earn the privilege
of being in these photos. It's not all right to go whining to a TV
station and earning the scourge of group of airline professionals.

2 comments:

Hmmm... only in the United States. I have never met a people as a whole who is that easily scared. Most people I know here in Europe, think about something for a moment before haring off and labeling something as dangerous or maybe even nefarious. Has common sense passed so many living in the US by? Or has the scare tactics used by politicians produced a population scared of the most harmless things?